Pope's meeting with Kim Davis not an endorsement, Vatican says

[Thomas_White]

Here is the oath of office:

30A.020 Oath of clerk and deputies.

Every clerk and deputy, in addition to the oath prescribed by Section 228 of the Constitution, shall, before entering on the duties of his office, take the following oath in presence of theCircuit Court:
"I, …, do swear that I will well and truly discharge the duties of the office of … County Circuit Court clerk, according to the best of my skill and judgment, making the due entries and records of all orders, judgments, decrees, opinions and proceedings of the court, and carefully filing and preserving in my office all books and papers which come to my possession by virtue of my office; and that I will not knowingly or willingly commit any malfeasance of office, and will faithfully execute the duties of my office without favor, affection or partiality, so help me God."

The language is plain, clear and unambiguous. If she refused to faithfully execute the duties of her office, in this instance without partiality, she should have resigned her office or, as it happened, go to jail.

 

[LittleFlower378]

Yea and she took this oath well before SSM became law, which should make her exempt from following or signing her name to such an unjust law as SSM.

 

[Dwyer]

But how would that work?

What if someone was a member of a religion which didn’t recognize property rights for women?

The couple divorces and the elders in this church would be authorized to distribute their property and the woman would get nothing?

There’s no same-sex marriage or opposite-sex civil marriage in the State of Israel.

But unmarried same-sex and opposite-sex couples in Israel have equal access to nearly all of the rights of marriage in the form of “unregistered cohabitation status”, similar to common-law marriage.

Same-sex marriages performed abroad can be recorded at the Israeli Administration of Border Crossings, Population and Immigration, according to a 2006 High Court of Justice ruling which defined such records as strictly ‘for statistical purposes’, thereby avoiding official recognition of same-sex marriages by the state. (Source: Wikipedia).

Divorce is regulated in Israel by the religious authorities (e.g., there are Rabbinical Courts in Israel for those who are Jewish who want divorce; I am guessing Canon Law courts for Catholics and Sharia Law for Muslims).

 

[BostonBarrister]

Yea and she took this oath well before SSM became law, which should make her exempt from following or signing her name to such an unjust law as SSM.

By that reasoning, if she had come into office before Loving v. Virginia was decided, she could deny licenses to interracial couples.

 

[LongingSoul]

Not true–REASONABLE accommodation must be made, but not UNCONDITIONAL accommodation. They are not the same.

Yes, you couldn’t expect the same conditions from say a cake shop owner who only had one cake decorator who was refusing to decorate a gay cake… as you would from a government department with the capacity to cover a case of conscientious objection without any loss of function.

 

[LongingSoul]

I see no intrinsic value to the name of the Clerk or any Government official being imprinted upon a document other than person executing the document. Typically, the affixation of such names is one of the vanities of office. If my opinion is important, I think the legislature should take them off.

Or at least just print a few with the clerks name blank in the event of ssm applications.

 

[Thomas_White]

Yea and she took this oath well before SSM became law, which should make her exempt from following or signing her name to such an unjust law as SSM.

Should all branches of government be similarly exempt from following U.S. Supreme Court decisions?

 

[LongingSoul]

Should all branches of government be similarly exempt from following U.S. Supreme Court decisions?

Conscientious objection means something that is inherently at odds with the juridical norm. If there was a provision that actually stipulated that every public servant could change the rules according to their conscience… that isn’t conscientious objection anymore. That’s just relativism gone mad.

Conscientious objection will always be an aberration to keep the conscience of society alive and working for the good.

 

[Thomas_White]

Or at least just print a few with the clerks name blank in the event of ssm applications.

IMHO, it is the elected County Clerk who has the legal authority to issue marriage licenses in that county. If the office of the county clerk issues a marriage license to a SS couple, it is necessarily done so under the sole authority of the county clerk, whether she signs the license or not. I do not believe she can delegate this authority. The federal judge apparently did allow for an accommodation, but I doubt it could have absolved her of the authority of her elected office. The federal court prohibited her from interfering in the issuance of SS licenses, and whether she signs them or not seems irrelevant.

 

[Thomas_White]

Conscientious objection means something that is inherently at odds with the juridical norm. If there was a provision that actually stipulated that every public servant could change the rules according to their conscience… that isn’t conscientious objection anymore. That’s just relativism gone mad.

Conscientious objection will always be an aberration to keep the conscience of society alive and working for the good.

No, the question is whether an elected official can legally refuse to perform the duties of his or her office and not whether they could conscientiously object to performing those duties.

It is noted Thoreau went to jail.

 

[Lily_Bernans]

Quite a few years ago (in 1960), a famous Catholic said something very relevant:

But if the time should ever come — and I do not concede any conflict to be even remotely possible — when my office would require me to either violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office; and I hope any conscientious public servant would do the same.

That was Senator John F. Kennedy.

*That’s *how one should behave when one’s religious convictions prevent one from exercising one’s duties as a government official.

Absolutely, positively right!

 

[Lily_Bernans]

Yea and she took this oath well before SSM became law, which should make her exempt from following or signing her name to such an unjust law as SSM.

That’s actually kind of funny. That would mean no county clerk in the country had to issue licenses to SS couples. Nothing like making something law that no one has to follow! And some people say the government doesn’t waste its time!

 

[Lily_Bernans]

No, the question is whether an elected official can legally refuse to perform the duties of his or her office and not whether they could conscientiously object to performing those duties.

It is noted Thoreau went to jail.

Thoreau was an admirable man of great conscience.

 

[josh987654321]

I’ve read the entire transcript of his press conference on the plane going back to Rome from the US, and Kim Davis’ name is never mentioned, although he does endorse conscientious objection. So do I. Can you provide a link to where the pope said anything specific to Kim Davis? I don’t think he ever has, but if you can provide a link, I will change my mind. Thank you…

The 2 minute video here -
washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/09/28/pope-francis-conscientious-objection-is-a-human-right-even-for-government-workers/

I hope this has helped

God Bless

Thank you for reading
Josh

 

[Lily_Bernans]

The 2 minute video here -
washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/09/28/pope-francis-conscientious-objection-is-a-human-right-even-for-government-workers/

I hope this has helped

God Bless

Thank you for reading
Josh

Okay, but it says he didn’t know who Kim Davis was. And yes, he says government workers have the right to object. No one here is saying they don’t. Some of us just think Mrs. Davis should quit her job. The pope doesn’t address that issue. I agree with the pope, government workers, too, have the right to object. However, I think they should quit. I don’t think special accommodations should be made for them. The pope does not address that issue.

 

[Thomas_White]

I agree government workers have the right to object in accordance with conscience, which I understand as conscientious objection. Kim Davis has said her issuing of SS marriage licenses would violate her religious beliefs. Is this truly conscientious objection? Or is it abiding to the teachings of her church and asserting the right of religious freedom to do so? There is a difference.

There are conscientious objectors without a formal religious affiliation. I would say everyone has a right to conscientious objection because everyone (okay, maybe) has a conscience. Freedom of religion is not really the same thing. It would seem a basic right but under the control of the state, whereas conscience is interior, perhaps innate, and a right that really cannot be restricted so long as a person accepts the consequences.

 

[graciew]

Okay, but it says he didn’t know who Kim Davis was. And yes, he says government workers have the right to object. No one here is saying they don’t. Some of us just think Mrs. Davis should quit her job. The pope doesn’t address that issue. I agree with the pope, government workers, too, have the right to object. However, I think they should quit. I don’t think special accommodations should be made for them. The pope does not address that issue.

My right ends when somebody else’s right begins. Isn’ t this something we repeated til boredom at school?
He said it was a human right .
As it is my right as a peer to work in peace and do my job too.
Good will yes, unlimited demand,no.
If the workplace becomes unmanageable,somebody has a right too to say enough.
I do not see this issue in terms or right or wrong but prudent and imprudent .
And people are lucky to have jobs. Prudence would indicate a different limit perhaps if you have to feed your children and there are 300 queuing to get your job.
Her merit is that she took the consequences. Now if her compass is ok or a bit tilted we cannot say. We Learn in the process. And she is learning just like all of us.
Too many choices. Too many alternatives. That is not so much the real world for me.

 

[_Abyssinia]

Check out this article from Eugene Volokh. You can see his credentials here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Volokh

The article is titled
When does your religion legally excuse you from doing part of your job?
washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/09/04/when-does-your-religion-legally-excuse-you-from-doing-part-of-your-job/

I paraphrase, he was conferring with her lawyers, and:

They confirmed that Davis would have no religious objections to her office handling the marriage licenses and certificates if a judge applying the Kentucky RFRA held that:

1. the licenses would be issued, as a matter of Kentucky law, under the authority of someone other than Davis or the County Clerk, for instance the County Judge Executive or a deputy clerk who was willing to put his name on them, and

1. the licenses reflected that accommodation, by including the name and office of the authorizing person (again, the Judge Executive or deputy clerk or whoever else) instead of Davis’s name and office.
   Davis’s objection to the federal judge’s order — and the licenses and certificates issued pursuant to that order — is that the licenses and certificates are still being issued (in her view) under her ostensible authority, even though Davis has not authorized them.

This accommodation is somewhat broader than the one I originally discussed above (which was just removing her name from the licenses and certificates, and possibly replacing it with “Rowan County Clerk”). She would object to having the documents note that they come from the office “Rowan County Clerk,” and she would also want an official declaration from the court that the licenses aren’t being issued under her authority. It’s possible that these demands go a bit too far for the Kentucky RFRA (as I noted above, the more burdensome a requested accommodation is, the less likely it is that a court will grant it), though it’s hard to tell, given that RFRAs are written in general terms, and a lot of the line-drawing questions are left for judges to make on a case-by-case basis. Still, the accommodation doesn’t seem tremendously burdensome, or that different from what’s already being done under the judge’s order, so it’s possible that this is what will happen.

Bold text by me

 

[LongingSoul]

Check out this article from Eugene Volokh. You can see his credentials here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Volokh

The article is titled
When does your religion legally excuse you from doing part of your job?
washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/09/04/when-does-your-religion-legally-excuse-you-from-doing-part-of-your-job/

I paraphrase, he was conferring with her lawyers, and:

Bold text by me

Thanks and props for your research regarding this issue, Abyssinia. I believe you are on the money regarding the place of conscientious objection in the spirit of Christian teachings!

 

[Thomas_White]

Check out this article from Eugene Volokh. You can see his credentials here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Volokh

The article is titled
When does your religion legally excuse you from doing part of your job?
washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/09/04/when-does-your-religion-legally-excuse-you-from-doing-part-of-your-job/

I paraphrase, he was conferring with her lawyers, and:

Bold text by me

This ‘accommodation’ would remove the authority to issue SSM marriage licenses from the County Clerk and provide that authority to someone else. Whether this duty of an elected Kentucky official could properly be removed and granted elsewhere by a federal court order would seem to raise a question. However, the supposed accommodation would resolve the matter for Davis by removing her authority as County Clerk to issue SSM marriage licenses. The Supreme Court has decided that SSM is the law of the land, and Davis cannot have it both ways by retaining the authority to issue SSM licenses and refusing to perform that duty. The result would not be that her religious freedom is observed by permitting her to refuse to grant those licenses as the County Clerk but rather that it would remove the authority to issue such licenses from her.